Boardgames To Go (Mark Johnson)

Who really believed me when I said I'd get Part 2 of the podcast out this week? I realize my credibility for prompt podcast publication isn't great. :) And yet--here it is! 

As I said in the first part, this is my now-traditional interview with my friend & BGG.con regular, Greg Pettit. He goes to the convention every year and plays a ton of new Essen releases. I'm quite jealous, and hope to finally make it back there myself in 2014.

We pick up the podcast halfway through our discussion about these games. Towards the end I get to offer my opinions about some new ones Greg didn't get to. The conversation also meanders a bit sometimes about keeping versus selling/trading games that don't make it to the table anymore, etc.

Openers: Ark Nova, Zoo Vadis

Nonsense Junkie

@elschmear

In between big, national cons like GenCon or BGGcon and your local Games Days are regional conventions. Some folks think these can be the best of all, focused on just playing games in a group all weekend long. EsCon is one of those in my area, held twice a year in EsCondido, California (get it?). Kind of like my own Santa Clarita is north of Los Angeles, Escondido is north of San Diego. I've been a few times, including just last month, and I hope to keep going. The guy behind EsCon, Steve Paap, joins me on this podcast while I pepper him with questions about what it takes to put on events like these.

Besides being a great host who runs a great event, Steve is a gamer-buddy of mine who nicely turns the table on me and asks me about my convention-going preferences and experiences.

Closers: Steve talks about positivity and how to overcome your own curmudgeon-ness, then I share how I've managed to play some card games over lunch hours at work...and the big boss is cool about it. Because she knows that games are good for our enjoyment together, and for sparking our brains individually.


-Mark

I've been doing this podcast now for more than eight years! I can't quite believe it myself. In the beginning, more than a handful of shows were audio session reports, which I then combined with feedback that I read "on-air." These are simple episodes, inevitably solo shows, and I often used them to go between episodes with a guest about a particular subject. Especially as those shows are getting more and more meta about the hobby itself, a simple "session report & feedback" episode is kind of a relief. I hope you like them, also. I particularly like reading feedback on the podcast, as it reminds me of the Letters section in Sumo, Counter, or other boardgame zines. Those were always the best part.

I've been doing this podcast for twenty years! I never would've guessed this in the beginning. The actual "birthday" for the podcast is March 3rd, so focus on the anniversary then. But for now, this is the start of Season 21. Blackjack!

Despite my teasing of Davebo during the Davecember episodes about putting too much stock in games-played data...I actually keep track of it myself. I'm not 100% accurate about it, but I'm probably 95% in recent years. (Earlier years weren't as detailed or accurate.) These days I'm using te BG Stats app, sync'd online to BGG. I don't record scores or game durations, but I DO record gaming locations, and that's permitted me to conclusively look at my data with & without online plays. For my own purposes, I've always included online plays in my totals, but I get why others may not.

MJ's Games Played in 2024 with . . . and without online plays

 

In this episode I look back at 2024, mostly the games I played the most, but also events like conventions and games days. I was surprised to learn how many more games I played last year: more titles, more locations, more people, more new games, more everything. Now that I think about...more podcast episodes, too (thank to Mark Madness and Davecember :-) ). Along the way, the stats make me consider the nature of my boardgaming, how I play lots of favorites over & over online, while I try more new games in-person. Will it always be that way? Is that ideal?

Last of all, I stumbled across a "shelfie" of my boardgame collection from 21 years ago, just about the same time I started this podcast. (And yes, those are my then-young kids' bikes in the bottom of the photo, and a toy rocking horse on the top shelf). Looking through it, I saw that my collection then was around 100 titles. It's double or triple that now. More significantly, I can see that I later sold three-quarters of this collection! Even accounting for the handful I re-acquired eventually, I can safely say that I turn over two-thirds of my collection. Put another way, that large fraction are not eternal keepers. I was disappointed to realize that, but perhaps it's ok? Perhaps many of our games are meant to be enjoyed just a handful of times, then passed on?

-Mark

 

Openers:
• Mark: Basketboss
• Dave: Istanbul

David Arnott

@Arnott

After hearing Ken Tidwell in last month’s podcast, both Dave Arnott and I were impressed with his enthusiastic, optimistic, and forward-looking perspective on the boardgame hobby…despite being an old timer like us. Even older, I think! While neither of us can fully match that, it was inspiring and I asked Dave to consider the topic with me in an open discussion for THIS episode.

We recorded it on an iPhone in a church choir room at our SoCal Games Day venue. The audio is ok, but you can tell it’s not my normal setup. Also unusual was the lack of a show outline. It means that I struggle a bit to stay focused on the goal. Too often I flip it around and revert to talking about how new hobbyists can/should appreciate the old classics. While that’s true, I tried to remember that I want to focus on how the OLD hobbyists can appreciate the new aspects of boardgaming.

What are those new aspects? They can be the newest titles, designers, and publishers themselves. They could be Kickstarter and other new ways of marketing & funding. Perhaps it’s the prevalence of online play, or solo options. The rise of YouTube videos for rules explanations. Lots of things. What am I missing?

The games I brought to my work event, full of hope. Partially fulfilled!

Closers:
• Dave: Is there a best way to lose a game?
• Mark: Gaming success with nongamer coworkers


-Mark

Eryn is back to talk with me about the results of the first round voting. Half of our original 64 game cover art entries have now been knocked out of the contest. Now successive voting rounds keep halving the remaining contestants every three days. What have we seen so far? No ties, though a couple matchups were close. A few more were blowouts. Are there common threads? Surprises? Plus...Eryn teaches me how to look at art more critically...by SQUINTING. Achievement unlocked.

-Mark

@Gregarius

As he's done many times, my friend Greg Pettit joins me for a mega-episode discussing all the games we played at BGGcon. Greg's an every-timer to BGGcon, while I went to the first one (2005), then a decade until my next in 2014 (first year I was an empty-nester), and sort of every-other-year since then. Looking back, I see I also went in 2015, 2017, 2019, 2022, and now 2024. I enjoy myself every time I go, but it's difficult to swing it every year.

When you listen to this episode, you may find it helpful to follow along with our geeklist. That way you can track what games we've talked about, which are coming next, and what are 5-star ratings are. I've also inserted the game boxes here in the order discussed, which will also appear in the shownotes.

The "Newest of the New" Games

            

A Bunch of Two-Player Games

      

Mostly Trick-Taking Games, or at least Card Games...but not always even that!

        

The "Leftovers" I Couldn't Otherwise Categorize

        

Old Favorites 

  

-Mark

I know a lot of Daves, and many of them have been on my podcast. With that in mind they're helping me celebrate a new holiday, Davecember, when each of them joins for me a mini-episode sprinkled randomly this month into your feed. I'll ask each of them similar questions, and each David also gets a bit of time to bring up something they want to share with my listeners. Enjoy!

 

David Thompson

@Skirmish_Tactics

Next is David Thompson, best known as the co-designer of the Undaunted series, War Chest, Resist, Sniper Elite, and as the sole designer for his Valiant Defense series (e.g. Pavlov's House) plus others.

-Mark

Play along and predict the winners at https://challonge.com/3abpsej6
Predictions must be submitted by March 12 to be in the contest

Mark Johnson

@MarkEJohnson

Patrick Pence

@Farsol

Last year I ran my first "March Madness" style, 64-game, single-elimination vote, with a contest to submit predictions for the entire bracket. If you've got a pool for the famous college basketball tournament in your office, or with your friends, then you know what this is. Actually, these days many other copycat tournament prediction contests exists--there's a big one on BoardGameGeek, my favorite movie podcast (Filmspotting) does one for films, and so on.

My version is similar, but it lists a bunch of games to be voted on against each other. Listeners suggested I call it Mark Madness, and that's what we did. Last year I picked all 64 games that we voted on, pulling from recent award winners in different categories. Listener Patrick Pence ended up the winner of the contest, and for that reason he's my co-host this month for the 2024 Mark Madness. Not only that, more listeners on our Discord channel suggested that the contest be more specific to me, asking me to populate the bracket with games that mean something to me. I did about half of those, and asked Patrick to do the same. Then I combined our lists, added a few "people's choice" titles to round it out, and then set up the bracket.

Play along! I hope we get a good number of folks who submit their own official predictions at challonge.com, which is free. Some have already done it. You've until March 12 to submit your brackets, so you need to move quickly. Then the voting rounds will start via Geeklist polling. As you can see from the chart above, the successive rounds of this voting will start happening every three days: On March 15 we'll have the results of the first round, when 64 teams are winnowed down to 32 survivors. Then it proceeds to the Sweet 16, Elite 8, Final 4, and Championship. Who will be the winner?

We expect to do "micro-episode" podcasts throughout the month to talk about each round. They'll show up in your regular feed, and I can link them here, too.

-Mark

It's the Final Four. Go vote now at https://boardgamegeek.com/geeklist/328714/boardgames-go-season-20-2024?itemid=10561730&commentid=12083072#comment12083072

I'm back! I'd said that my time off (the "sabbatical") was only temporary, and that I planned to return to the microphone to continue Boardgames To Go. And that's just what happened. During the year that I've been away from this podcast, I've still been playing plenty of games, which you can read about. I've been doing more wargaming, which you can hear about. And perhaps you've seen or heard me at BGGcon or on other podcasts & videocasts. Which means I was never really gone. Nonetheless, those things are different from producing my own boardgame podcast, and I'm happy to be doing that again.

To kick off my return, I'm featuring a roundtable discussion with a bunch of friends after we played a full day of Star Wars-themed boardgames. You may recall that I once grumbled about boardgame themes that were for kids (including kids that never grew up), not grown-ups. I have to admit I still feel that way about most games involving goblins, zombies, or spaceships. BUT...you're all welcome to call me a hypocrite when it comes to Star Wars. Here is where I cave. I was in 5th grade when A New Hope was released, and it may not be an exaggeration to say it changed my life. I'd decided to be a "spacecraft architect" the year before, and that's sort of what really happened in my life, but Star Wars probably sealed the deal. I remember talking with a college classmate who had a similar experience, and she grew up in Singapore. What an influence!

Back in 1977 I was everything Star Wars. My brother & I saw the film many times in the theater. I had the LED watch, the belt buckle (this was the 70s), the t-shirt, the action figures, the X-wing, the LP records... When the prequels came around my kids were the perfect age to enjoy them with me. Now that the new movies are upon us, I'm loving the fact that they're December releases, so even though they're away to college (& beyond), we can still enjoy them as a family over the holidays. Star Wars has always been an important part of my life.

What about Star Wars games? Well, yes, kind of. It took a long while for some really good games about these favorite movies to arrive on the table. I had the vintage Escape from the Death Star game, but it's not good. We played some Star Wars RPG when it came out in the 1980s, and a couple of the associated wargames. (Star Warriors was tedious, but Assault on Hoth was good.) Though I'm only a casual computer and videogamer, in the 2000s I definitely had wonderful times playing Rebel Assault, Rogue Squadron, Battlefrontand others with my son. Anything we could play co-op was our favorite.

More recent years have produced quite a few family strategy games with a Star Wars subject. Oddly enough, the prequels have some of the best games, probably because that's just when Craig Van Ness and Rob Daviau at Hasbro were doing incredible things with the production capability of that mainstream publisher. Other publishers, too, however. Now we're seeing a resurgence in Star Wars boardgames, like an awakening in the Force...

I invited some friends over to play several of these titles for a Star Wars-themed game day, and then flipped on the recorder to have a roundtable discussion of them. Enjoy!

-Mark

P.S. AFTER the Star Wars game day we learned about the Black Series (aka deluxe) edition of the Risk game. It addresses most of our grumbling about the production shortcuts in the mass market edition we played...but not all of them. I'm not sure if it's worth the extra money. And I've already bought a couple MicroMachines to get figs for the Falcon and Executor in my game.

 

Here are #21-30 on the list, counted down in reverse order as we discuss them on the podcast.

After the previous episode of 100 Great Games, we received some (ahem) feedback regarding the games we didn’t like (I’m looking at you, Taj Majal), or didn’t know much about (such as War of the Ring). I’m pleased to say we don’t have that issue this time. I get to look over the still-secret list going all the way to Number One, and I can safely say that we’re familiar with all of the remaining games. Which is as you’d expect, right? As we get near the top we’re getting into even more of the modern classics that every self-respecting gamer should seek out & play. But, since you’re only hearing three voices from a survey of many more people, we may not all LOVE the remaining games. But we certainly respect them. (And as you’ll hear, in many cases we do love them!)

We’re nearing the end, only two shows left after this one to finish the countdown! We’ve already had suggestion for a supplemental episode, and it’s under consideration. Other ideas are welcome. 

Finally, taking a page from Geek Weekly, I’m going to try adding a poll to each of my podcast episodes. I’d like folks to check out the blog (perhaps comment below), and there’s always a good question to pose after a podcast. Be sure to listen to the episode first, to get the context for the question. In this case, it’s about the theming (or not) in Knizia’s Lord of the Rings.

Opener: Welcome to Season 20(!!!) of this little podcast

I didn't make it to BGGcon last November, but several of my buddies did. Two of them, Greg Pettit and Dave O'Connor, join me on the podcast to talk about their experience there. For almost half the time we talk about about everything BUT the games (the venue, the crowd, the bazaar, the puzzle hunt, etc)...and then we get into a lot of games. We talk about Heat, Anunnaki, Wandering Towers, Bristol 1350, 1902 Melies, Blood on the Clocktower, Oak, Tricky Badger, Match of the Century, That’s Not A Hat, Rebel Princess, Rollet, Armadillo, At The Office, Voodoo Prince, Gang of Dice, Babylonia, Havalandi, Pax Pamir, Turncoats, Cosmoctopus, Nemesis, Cosmic Frog, and The Thing! Whew!

Closer: Playing games with family (especially party games) using whatever "rules" and "scoring" are most fun

-Mark

Openers: Evolution, Bruges/The Last Spike/Treasure Hunter (also EsCon)

I know this is a subject that resonates with many gamers--having too many games. How many is too many? It differs for everyone. Even the reason to think about "too many" games differs for many people. In my case, it's a physical limitation of storage space. For other folks, it's about saving money (or using proceeds from game sales to buy new stuff). For still others, they want to focus on playing old favorites more & more, less focus on the latest new thing. I guess for most of us, it's a combination. Greg adds to his "degree of difficulty" for this effort by wanting to have an attractive visual library of games.

I've got a medium-sized collection (a few hundred)...but I've run out of room. Greg's got a pretty enormous collection (a few thousand)...and he's also out of room. How do we decide what to downsize? Greg approaches it in terms of series, versions, or expansions, finding clusters of games he wants to keep, and how that allows him to (theoretically) release a bunch of similar series, versions, or expansions.


Closers: Getting active in the hobby community, Finding gamers after a (temporary) relocation

-Mark

One more episode about BGGcon! Can you tell I was excited to return? During the con itself I recorded several daily mini-episodes with Greg Pettit (by the end they weren't so mini!). In those we talked about several of the games we played, though not all. If you want to see ALL of the games I played, they're posted on their own geeklist.

Everyone knows I prefer lighter/shorter board & card games. Not exclusively, but that's my kind of game. It shows in my lists of games played. That's part of the reason I invited two other gamer-buddies onto this episode, since they are more willing to go after meatier euros. Though they, too, will play some older classics and/or lighter games. We played some of these together, but many were titles I didn't see...or actively avoided. You can sort of follow along with the discussion by flipping back & forth between their two geeklists with 5-star ratings for the games they played at BGGcon.

Brian Murray's list | Rick Byrens' list | (and Mark's list)

-Mark

This micro-episode shares some overview of the Rounds 1 & 2 voting, such as blowout wins and close calls. I get to share the Sweet 16 and imagine which of the four games in each of the four divisions will emerge victorious to battle against the others. Hint: don't bet against The Crew (any version!)

Please remember to keep voting. Each round of voting is open for a few days, and I keep adding to the same geeklist to do it. Scroll down to find it.

https://boardgamegeek.com/geeklist/312399/mark-madness-2023-bgtgs-battle-award-winners?itemid=9636466#9636466

Here are #11-20 on the list, counted down in reverse order as we discuss them on the podcast. I thought we'd have nothing but praise for all of these highly-ranked games...but perhaps I should've known that that the three of us would take turns expressing reservations about even these amazing games. (It's going to make my upcoming "Mark Hates Games" episode all the more relevant.) ;)

In my poll associated with the last installment of 100 Great Games, I asked about the theming--or lack thereof--in Knizia's landmark cooperative game, [thing=823][/thing]. The smallest portion felt this was a mechanical, pasted-on theme kind of game. Instead, most felt that the theme does come through from the cooperative gameplay (mechanisms), while several more credited the amazing artwork for evoking the theme.

This time I'm returning to Knizia for the poll. It just worked out that way. We discussed Medici in a previous episode (and I recently played the unfortunately-ugly latest edition), and now Ra has come up. We used to ask ourselves which of Knizia's "auction trilogy" was our favorite (these plus Modern Art). That's what I'm asking here, only Mark Jackson suggested I widen it to include several more of Knizia's excellent auction-based games (including Mark's favorite, as you can hear in the episode). Did I forget to include your favorite? Tell me so in a comment, below.

David Thompson

(Skirmish_Tactics)

 

Chris Marling

(hairyarsenal)

 

Opener: Mansions of Madness (2nd edition), TIME Stories, Terraforming Mars, Great Western Trail


This is really a double-episode. In the second half we talk about more Essen titles, and the experience of my two guests who attended from England. However, these aren't just any two guests--they are collaborative game designers. Their big release at Essen 2016 was Armageddon, and they tell about the experiences designing, pitching, and launching the game. Along the way there are other stories about the collaborative design process, and how those designer-publisher pitch meetings go behind-the-scenes at Essen. It's a fascinating discussion.

Then I asked them to share just a handful of particular titles they acquired and enjoyed from the event. More good stuff.

Closer: The pitfalls of looking at BGG ratings without context; the Splendor app...and its achievement system; does a game become classic when people forget the rules?


-Mark

I know a lot of Daves, and many of them have been on my podcast. With that in mind they're helping me celebrate a new holiday, Davecember, when each of them joins for me a mini-episode sprinkled randomly this month into your feed. I'll ask each of them similar questions, and each David also gets a bit of time to bring up something they want to share with my listeners. Enjoy!

David G.

@davebo

First up is David Gullett, aka Davebo. He's got a thing for data, whether it's good or not.

-Mark

As you may recall, Stephen, Mark, and I already finished our countdown of 100 Great Games in an earlier episode. However, for a long while we'd planned to do one more episode together--this one--where we talk about our own picks, surprises, disappointments, trends, and so on. I foolishly thought this would be posted before Christmas! Will I never learn?! :-)

-Mark

Remember when I used to do "Session Report & Feedback" episodes? Me neither. These are when I'd just talk about some games I've played recently (not part of a meta topic, just a session report), and tack a segment on the end where I read & respond to some listener feedback. In theory these should be a show that's easy for me bang out every once in a while. They also have the [i]potential[/i] of being shorter episodes.

At any rate, this time I stitched together some accounts of recent card games I've had on the table. The coincidence of a couple euro card games on the table recently sparked an idea for a future game group session that focuses on traditional card games. We haven't done that yet, but we're excited to try some titles like Euchre, Spades, 1000 (the marriage game), Cribbage, Pinochle, and so on. (I've also just joined an Up & Down the River card game group at lunch.)

But that's for later. In this episode I'm still talking about modern, euro card games with their unique decks, rules, and mechanisms...

Openers: Root, My Gold Mine, and LAMA Dice

Please join us on the Boardgames To Go discord server where you can chat online with other podcast listeners.

The Spiel des Jahres and Kennerspiel des Jahres awards were announced last month. Congratulations to the designers and publishers of Cascadia and Living Forest. These are still the awards with the most worldwide influence and importance, despite coming from just one corner of it--Germany.

However, in this episode I’m not talking very much about those recent winners. Instead, my friend and frequent podcast guest Greg Pettit joins me on the mic to talk about the previous ten years of winners. If these awards are as big of a deal as I say, then shouldn’t the winners from the previous decade still be popular & relevant? Still on the table in our game groups? Let’s talk about that.

The yardstick to compare them against is Catan. Actually, you can add [thing=9209]Ticket to Ride[/ticket], too. Both of those games won the Spiel des Jahres many years ago. We’ll be coming to the 30th anniversary of Catan in just a few more years, and Ticket To Ride is approaching its 20th anniversary. In a hobby that bemoans the short shelf life of new titles, these two continue to be everywhere. If you run into a new person at school or work that has played “our games,” there’s a good chance they’ve played Catan and Ticket To Ride. THAT’S influence & importance.

Do any of the latest decade's Spiel des Jahres winners have that kind of impact? I’m not sure if any of them do, though a few may have some staying power. Greg & I talk about that, combining our own opinions & observations with “data” from BGG Rankings and what’s on mass market retail shelves at Target or Barnes & Noble. In the US (and maybe Canada?) those are a good litmus test of staying power with the larger public of game-players.

The Kennerspiel winners are a little different. Whether these are more for “gamers” or not is up for debate. Here the BGG ranking is probably a better measure. Interestingly enough, the SdJ’s have a more constant “decay” in their popularity and ranking, while the Kenners have more highs & lows: titles that have done a better job sticking around, and others that are dropping off. The nature of this award has been shifting, too.

I hope you enjoy the discussion.

Closers: Greg says games need to be introduced & taught more than simply given as gifts. Then Mark mentions the enduring power of Dungeons & Dragons. Somehow they both talk about giving games away.

-Mark

Opener: 7Seas (Or Scopa, if you want to learn the original)

Remember when I used to do "Essen Anticipation" episodes? I know I did several in the past, but it's been a while. This year, Essen sort of snuck up on me. I went through the preview tool on BGG, but never managed to completely make it through. The tool is easier to use than ever, and now includes all of the things I need in a preview (designer, publisher, photo, brief description, and link to more). And yet...it's just too much. Is it too much in an absolute sense? Too much for anybody? Too much for a healthy hobby and industry?

I don't know about all of that. I just know that it's now too much for me. Which isn't too say I'm no longer enthusiastic about Essen--I merely let it kind of wash over me, not trying to keep up. I'll certainly hear about the consensus picks for the best new titles, and I may also find out about some more obscure ones for oddball reasons--perhaps my thematic interest, a friend stumbled across it, a weird speculative purchase on Amazon.de... whatever!

This year my "Essen episode" starts with mentioning how close I was, on a business trip to Germany and the Netherlands just a few days before Essen. But I didn't make it to Spiel. I bought some games from Europe...but I "cheated" by ordering from Amazon.de instead of packing from local shops into my luggage to bring home.

(The Essen coffee mug is my favorite and lasting purchase from Spiel when I last went in 2016. I may not even own any of the games I purchased then, but I always enjoy this mug!)


At any rate, when I went through most of the enormous Essen preview list, only this handful of oddball titles were the ones most interesting to me. Several are demos, most are oddly personal thematic choices that may not prove to be good games (they rarely do!), but they're my personal choices. Not recommended for everyone!

For a more universal, reliable recommendation list of new titles from Essen, you should look to the Fairplay Scoutaktion report. These are the annual feedback collections that Fairplay magazines collects at their Essen booth from any gamer who stops by to share their rating. On the one hand, lots of games are barely demonstrated at Essen, so the ratings may not be based on informed plays. On the other hand, they've been doing these Scoutaktion reports for decades, and they've proven to be reasonably good barometers for the hits of Essen. A long while back, I tried to do some analysis of their track record, and as I recall it just made some errors of omission sometimes.

So take a look at the final list of top-rated games from this report. I also recommend Ben Bruckhart's article about this list at Opinionated Gamers. This remains one of the better websites/blogs about our hobby. Ben also takes a retrospective look back at the list from the previous year, something I appreciate.

Finally, another great thing about Fairplay magazine is their annual ranking of the best card games. This is called their A La Carte prize, and I've repeatedly found nice surprises on these top ten lists. Especially since small card games may not be made in English language editions, and can go undiscovered even in 2022.

Closer: At a management retreat for my job I brought a bunch of games. One person had requested them, but really this represented hope that I might get a group of coworkers to enjoy them with me. These days I'm a lot smarter about what to suggest in those settings, and after the recording I was successful! We played Just One and it was an enormous hit.


-Mark

A small, solo episode for me to talk about the boardgaming I'm doing during the coronavirus safe-at-home quarantine that so many of us are under. Mostly that means online gaming of one form another, whether a dedicated website or via videochat. My face-to-face gaming has been extremely limited, almost non-existent. I really miss it, as I miss hanging out with my friends.

Fortunately we have this technology to keep us in connection and camaraderie, even during this difficult times.

I didn't do an opener & closure in this small episode, but I did wrap up with some anticipation for the upcoming Spiel des Jahres nominations, especially the curve-ball surprises we sometimes get. The announcement comes later this month in May. Looking forward to it! There's a great geeklist where you can read everyone's guesses for games that could be nominated, adding your own ideas or giving thumbs/comments to ones you agree with.

Online boardgaming sites
BoardgameArena
Yucata.de
Boardgames Online
MabiWeb
SpielByWeb

-Mark

P.S. Just played JackBox (Drawful2) with my kids long-distance!

Last full day of BGG.con. Last day at all, really, since tomorrow I check out of the hotel & head to my airport terminal/gate around noon. Apparently the Library will be closed. Though I have a few games of my own on-hand, it may not work out for me to play any games. Might just be saying my goodbyes and having last conversations with friends.

Today, though, started & ended (for me) with big events. At the start of the day was the Flea Market. Greg had 4+ tubs of games to sell there, and I got to be his assistant. We were up relatively early (alarm clock required) in order to set up in the hour before the doors were opened to buyers. Then THEY have one hour to shop, haggle, and purchase before everything has to be closed up again.

The end of the day had the "closing ceremonies" for BGG.con, including lots of well-earned thank-yous, prize giveaways, and some announcements for BGG.con's future. You've probably seen this already. In addition to BGG.con (which will continue unchanged for next year & beyond, when I hope to return), they've now added BGG<3FAM--meaning something like BGG Loves Families)--a family-friendly (spouses & kids) version of the convention. The first one of these is next Memorial Day Weekend. This is in addition to the previously announced BGG game cruise, BGG@SEA. The empire grows...


In between, I got to play some more games and go out for BBQ one more time. Greg & I were finally able to successfully play Isaribi. Still thinking about it, but I think I like it quite a bit. I already like Hayashi's Sail to India, so he's definitely a designer for me to watch. Also, I wanted to get some recent Knizia titles to the table, which we did with both Orongo andRondo. I think the latter is a pleasant pastime or family game (for two), while Orongo is an unfortunate miss for me. We also played the older (but still good!) title, Yspahan. 

Just as we did a couple years ago, Dave & I recorded a podcast on the way back during our boardgame road trip to play with friends in Fresno. Recorded on a smartphone in the car, there's more background noise in this one, but listeners were ok with it back in 2013, so here we go again. We talk about some of the games played, but also some behind-the-scenes stories from GameNight!, as well as Dave's work on a couple word game apps, Noodle Doodle and Tuklu.

-Mark

Openers:

Mark: Fishing
Steve: Trick Taking Game Conventions (here's one, and here's another)

Closers:
Mark: What do I think is an OG game? I can tell what it ain't!
Steve: What would new boardgamers think is an OG game?

Nonsense Junkie

@elschmear

My friend Steve Paap returns to his set of interview questions for me. A year and a half ago, back on episode 214, Steve turned the microphone around on me. Now he's back with more questions for yours truly.

 

First, though, he tries to rile me up by having me defend my "favorite boardgame" Entdecker from a variety of BGG comments from folks who didn't like it. They rate it a 4, 3, or 2, and explain why. Does it get under my skin? Not really. He says I'm too nice for that, Maybe that's it, but the truth is that no game is really for everybody, and I'm well aware that Entdecker is less-than-average for many gamers. There are some comments I find just inaccurate and wrong, though--that's true.

-Mark

A long day, starting with a 4am alarm clock in Santa Clarita, California, ending with a 2am bedtime in Dallas, Texas. I'm here, and taking it in. My roommate is Gregarius, the same Greg Pettit you've heard on the podcast. He's a native Texan (Houston), and has made it to EVERY BGG.con. Besides my roommate, he's also my able guide for this event.

On my plane I saw Dave Arnott, Mike Schwerdtfeger, and met some other SoCal gamers. Maybe next year(!) I'll plan to sit by someone. I thought about playing a game on the flight, but decided I'd have more than enough when I go to DFW.

I got registered, Greg toured me around the various ballrooms, library, and other venues. Today I played La Granja, Rolling Japan, Pandemic: The Cure, Spinball, and Port Royal.

Stephen Glenn and Mark Jackson rejoin me (Mark JOHNson) to continue this series. In 2012, these two guys polled a number of experienced gamers (a few designers, many reviewers, all enthusiasts) for their top games, consolidated their answers, and asked to come on my podcast to count down the results. I was pleased to be part of the poll, and doubly pleased to have them on Boardgames To Go. I really like how Stephen describes this: 

"a fun list to discuss over coffee & pie."

The poll was for our favorite games, not necessarily the best games. We even got to submit a top fifteen, which took the usual tough request for a top ten and gave us more breathing room for five more titles. I know in my case, it made it easier to add some very recent games to my longstanding favorites.  On each podcast we're counting down a bunch of titles  until we get to a final show with the Top Ten. I'll be interspersing 100 Great Games countdown episodes with my other podcast episodes.

Here are #31-40 on the list, counted down in reverse order as we discuss them on the podcast.

This show was especially fun because BGG had gone down for maintenance when we did our recording! That meant that we had to go on our own knowledge and memories of the games' designers, publishers, and years, in addition to usual opinions about how they play. Fortunately, we're getting so high up in the list now that the games are very notable. I think we did pretty well without our normal reference material...but you tell me!

Note: we had a little audio problem with Mark Jackson halfway through the podcast, but stick with us! I edited around it as best I could, and it gets better after the Ave Caesar/Ausgebremst/Q-Jet discussion.

The guys join me for part 2 of our 100 game countdown series.

Stephen Glenn and Mark Jackson join me for part 3 of our 100 game countdown series.

http://www.boardgamegeek.com/blogpost/19524

Opener: The final winners for Mark Madness! Castles of Burgundy and 

eryn roston

@baditude

Closer: A specific call for feedback to the podcast. Tell me what you like me to do more of, or do less. Session Report & Feedback episodes, like the old days? All About shows (more old days)? Something else?

Over the years I've been to many game conventions, both big & small. However, it wasn't until this past month that I attended a Dice Tower event. The Dice Tower West annual game convention is held in the west, in Las Vegas, which means it's a pretty easy drive for me - four hours across the southwest. Though I'm not really a Vegas kind of guy, this is still a big geek convention of boardgamers, right? Right. In that, it felt very familiar to the multiple times I've visited BGGcon in Dallas...just in a different city, hosted by a different organization. I knew some of my buddies had attended in prior years, and many months I started asking them if they'd attend in 2024. I think most of us were on the fence, but hearing other friends may attend helped collectively push most of us into signing up. A couple had to back out due to unexpected life commitments, but enough of my gang went that we were able to fill game tables the whole time.

In this episode, I talk about ALL of the games I played during this Wednesday-Sunday major event. Half of that discussion is about old games, or OG games, or whatever you want to call them. How old? We decided the cutoff should be a quarter-century. Focusing one of our convention days on titles at least 25 years old meant we had a full Friday of pre-2000 games. Games from the last century...the last millennium! Practically speaking, we played games from the 1990s, which is when many of our group got into modern boardgaming, including yours truly.

If you appreciate retro gaming like we do, you'll love the first half of the episode. If not, skip ahead to the interlude music break near the 55-minute mark, and then I transition into some newer titles. That represented the other half of what I played at the convention. Including lots of card games, which are having their moment in the sun right now. Wonderful! (Even though I didn't love all of the card games I played, as you'll hear, I love that we're playing so many of them again.)

-Mark

Have you ever played Bunco? I'm now in a couples Bunco group, a new thing for me. It goes without saying that this is not the kind of gaming group I normally have, and talk about on the show. These are not hobby gamers. They aren't even party gamers. They're just regular folks, all empty nest-ers (or close to it, like me), who get together to talk, have dinner & drinks. That we play a game or two at the end of the night for a few bucks' stakes is purely a social activity, absolutely not intended to be competitive. After Bunco kind of wore off, the group switched to LCR. Yikes!

Here's my Catch-22: I want a game that's more fun for me because it has a little bit of strategy, but everyone else wants a game that is so easy & automatic that it doesn't pressure anyone or limit conversation. Almost by definition, this is a no-man's land since it's looking for a game that has decision-making yet requires no thought.

Well, gamers often make suggestions about titles they think are light enough, but really aren't. Or we consider party games. In this podcast I cover that very topic with Dave Gullett, who is the rare gamer who understands my dilemma! In the show we go through a lot of ideas, and I proceed to basically shoot them all down for one reason or another. Am I the problem? Or is it basically un-solvable with the constraints I've given myself?

Look at all the types of games we consider, and please give me your own ideas. Particularly if you've had some success in similar situations, tell me about the games you played as well as describing that situation and its other players.

Opener: Noli

Closer: Just a few games that caught my eye or attention in other ways coming at Essen. Galileo Galilei, In the Footsteps of Marie Curie, Port Arthur, Amazonia Park, and Flatiron

    

My call for feedback earlier this year sparked both halves of this podcast. First, there was a request for me to explain my history with the best, most famous, and original CCG, Magic The Gathering. Though I dabble a tiny bit even now, there were a few years in the beginning when I dove in with both feet. It was, as we now say, a lifestyle game. I still think it's incredible, clearly one of my all-time favorites, but it's not easy to keep up with Magic and other games. Therefore it's mostly part of my gaming past, but I have such fond memories and will definitely play a game here or there in the future. Such as on M:tG Arena, the fantastic free-to-play digital version of the game.

When Settlers of Catan (and Air Baron! another of my early favorites) showed up, eurogames essentially displaced Magic for me. Though we called them German Games at the time. I was hooked, and now it's been nearly thirty years. That sounds like a a long time--and it is!--but I have a hobby gaming history before Catan and Magic. I've told parts of that history on this podcast before, but when someone who listens to the show was surprised to hear I'd once worked for Steve Jackson Games, I realized it's been about 18 years since I told that story! So you'll forgive the repetition, if by some chance you remember my tale the first time. After talking about Magic, I go back to the beginning of my hobby gaming with a variety of stops along the way. There were years of wargames (both science fiction and some historical) and lots of roleplaying games. Like Magic, my RPG days are something I'll always remember fondly, but I'm not sure if I'll ever play those again.

    

 

-Mark

Every year I like to look back over the previous one in boardgaming, and reflect on what happened. At the most basic level, this means reviewing my statistics, the number of distinct titles played, as well as the overall total of games played. For me that's typically about 100 titles, 300 total plays, but you'll hear how 2012 was a bit higher than normal. I'm not entirely sure why that was, though I have some ideas. I also talk through my "nickels & dimes" list of games played at least five or ten times.

However, those sort of stats aren't as meaningful for self-reflection as it is to remember some particularly notable games or individual plays. Some games just stand out, regardless of the number of times they were played. My games of Olympia 2000 (v. Chr.) and Reiner Knizia's Decathlon, played during this summer's real Olympics in London are an example. So is my partnership game of Mr. President, played during the last US Presidential campaign season is another.

I often play games online, though Play-By-Web sites like Yucata.de, Michael Schacht's Boardgames Online, or Brass Online. Not everyone agrees that these plays "count," but I do. More important, they let me keep playing games with friends I don't see during the week, or even friends that are in distant places like Houston or Afghanistan. :-) (For what it's worth, I don't log iOS plays, even if they're against a friend. As the games on that platform get better & better, that could change in the future.)

Around the discussions about specific games are other observations about the recovery of my local gaming group, my rekindled interest in wargames, the undeniable impact of Kickstarter (not necessarily on me), solo boardgaming, and why I'm sometimes reverting to the term German Games instead of euros. It has to do with my preference for a style of shorter, elegant game that's more at home in 2000 among Carcassonne, Africa, or Bohnanza rather than 2012's overburdened euros with their resource economies and player status boards. The criticism of my favorite style of boardgame is that they're "superfillers" that are just chasing the Spiel des Jahres for wide, family appeal. Even with a group of gamers over on Friday night, those are the sort of games I like.

Openers: KeyForge and Lost Cities Rivals

Closers: "It's light but and I liked it" / Fillers fill me up; Do gaming statistics add or subtract from your enjoyment?

Over the many years on this podcast I've interviewed plenty of gamers, and a few designers. Apparently I'd missed talking to a publisher, however. I first encountered David Harding as an online gamer-friend, whether through Yucata.de, Twitter, or just email. We played some games together and traded messages. Somewhere along the way he became a game designer, and then a game publisher. David designed & produced Elevenses, One Zero One, and Matcha, then broadened into publishing other designers' titles. Most notably, he has produced new editions and new games from Reiner Knizia himself. Besides the well-known Medici, David and Grail Games brought us Knizia's most substantial new game in many years, Yellow & Yangtze. In fact, Grail Game has published quite a number of amazing Knizia titles.

Have you ever been dissatisfied in your day job and fantasized about being a game designer or publisher? David's story will resonate with you. Clearly it isn't easy, and it doesn't make you rich. In fact, you probably still need to stick with that day job. But there's a joy & pride in bringing thee games to the public, too, and you can hear that in David's voice and story.

Towards the end, David describes the current state of the hobby in a way that will resonate with anyone who takes a longer view. Although he's super careful to allow any gamer their own way of enjoying the hobby, personally he's the sort that appreciates repeated plays and games we can all stick with. Or even just games that he likes personally.

"Like the games you like." Good advice for all of us.

-Mark

P.S. You can tell from this podcast that David is unique, fun, and self-deprecating personality. If you want to see & hear more of his charming quirkiness, check out his Grail Games channel on YouTube.

Opener: Votes for Women

What is "normal" in our hobby? For a while I've realized that what I felt most comfortable & familiar with in boardgaming is a little but stuck in the past, not coincidentally the times when I was first diving in deep with it. This is about the 10-year period from 1996-2006, give or take. The hobby today feels different. It IS different. Not better or worse (I try to convince myself), just different. But different in what ways?

In this solo episode I consider this. Before I tackle the present day I think aloud about how the hobby started, how it progressed, and how it got to when I first played Settlers, Medici, or Bohnanza. I think a lot about the perspective of someone working at Origins or Gencon, perhaps at a game distributor's booth, going to those events from the 1970s to the present day. I actually think there are some that span those fifty years(!) in our hobby, if not always behind a booth then at least participating in it. From that vantage point, you'd definitely see things change over time, and I think with some hindsight you could identify some "waves" or "generations" within the hobby. Characteristics more of one time than another. Trends that come & go.

Even within euro-style hobby boardgaming, I think you could subdivide my earlier era to today and note some important differences. That's what I'm thinking about, and I welcome input from listeners, too. Am I all wet here? Or am I onto something? Does it even matter in any way?

I think it may matter in the sense that I'm trying to stay true to the types of boardgaming I most enjoy, while simultaneously NOT becoming a fossilized dinosaur. Can it be done? Of course. Thinking about these kinds of things is how I go about it.

Closer: Mark Madness 2023 tournament! Congrats to winner Patrick Pence!

-Mark

Stephen Glenn and Mark Jackson rejoin me (Mark JOHNson) to continue this series. In 2012, these two guys polled a number of experienced gamers (a few designers, many reviewers, all enthusiasts) for their top games, consolidated their answers, and asked to come on my podcast to count down the results. I was pleased to be part of the poll, and doubly pleased to have them on Boardgames To Go. I really like how Stephen describes this: 

The poll was for our favorite games, not necessarily the best games. We even got to submit a top fifteen, which took the usual tough request for a top ten and gave us more breathing room for five more titles. I know in my case, it made it easier to add some very recent games to my longstanding favorites. On each podcast we're counting down 15 titles until we get to a final show with the Top Ten. I'll be interspersing 100 Great Games countdown episodes with my other podcast episodes.

Here are #41-55 on the list, counted down in reverse order as we discuss them on the podcast.

Now we're really getting into some notable titles with firm reputations of being great games. And yet, one or more of us keep finding games that we take issue with. There's nothing wrong with that, of course--these are the compiled results of many gamers, not just us. You should understand that we can respect a game, and its place on this list, even if we don't like it personally. In fact, I hope that sort of different opinion makes for a good listen, and will spark some feedback in the blog comments, below.

Although I've only made it to one BGG.con so far (the first one, I think), my buddy and frequent BGTG guest Greg Pettit is a regular attendee. For the past several years he's joined me on the podcast after the event to tell us all about it, especially the new Essen games he was able to play. I love hearing about them.

Something else that fascinates me is the slippery topic of figuring out which new games are the best ones. Not to get too highfalutin, but this is really the timeless matter of judging art. Why are some artistic works better than others, and do those opinions hold over time? In our little way, I like to explore this topic by prompting Greg for a "star rating" for these games (adding my own where I can)...and then revisiting those ratings a year later. It's only one year, but that's enough for the bloom to be off the rose for some new titles. Even some that we honestly love struggle to make it back to the table. Most interesting of all, a select few appear to be new classics--or at least personal keepers. Gosh, I love this topic, as subjective as it is.

Want to follow along, and even add your own star ratings? You can do it on the companion geeklist I've posted for this show. You can also go back to the lists we did in 2012 & 2011 to do the same, or measure our prognostication skills.

Greg played so many games this year (and I added some of my own), that the podcast got to be quite long. For that reason I've split it into two halves. I'll post the first half now, and the second half at the end of the week.

-Mark

Several years ago, Stephen Glenn and Mark Jackson polled a number of experienced gamers (a few designers, many reviewers, all enthusiasts) for their top games. I was pleased to be part of it. They consolidated the results, and published them with commentary in a blog called "The One Hundred." It carried the tongue-in-cheek subtitle "The Official & Completely Authoritative 100 Best Games of All Time Ever Without Question...So There!" Not everyone got the irony of that title, but if you knew these guys you'd know they never take themselves too seriously. 

Now in 2012 they felt it was time to do the survey again, adding some new people to the mix to get a broader range of input. I was happy to be asked for my input again, and then pleasantly surprised that they asked for my help with Boardgames To Go to get the survey results out via podcast. Hurray! This time around, I really like how Stephen describes it: "a fun list to discuss over coffee & pie." We were asked for our favorite games, not necessarily the best games. We even got to submit a top fifteen, which took the usual tough request for a top ten and gave us more breathing room for five more titles. I know in my case, it made it easier to add some very recent games to my longstanding faves.  

I know a lot of Daves, and many of them have been on my podcast. With that in mind they're helping me celebrate a new holiday, Davecember, when each of them joins for me a mini-episode sprinkled randomly this month into your feed. I'll ask each of them similar questions, and each David also gets a bit of time to bring up something they want to share with my listeners. Enjoy!

 

David Arnott

@Arnott

Bringing our Davecember to a fitting close, I welcome back Dave Arnott. He was the guy on my podcast earlier this fall when the idea of Davecember was born. He's been on plenty of my episodes before, but now we get to talk more about him.

-Mark

Like a lot of you, I keep track of the games I play, mostly to look back on and contemplate. The end of the year is the perfect time to do that, and I've been doing it since 1996. I don't track wins or much else--mere reflecting on the games played last year (total plays & unique titles) is what I enjoy. Even though I'd like to focus on my favorites, there are just so many new, interesting games that make their way to the table. You know I'm not a Cult of the New guy, but that's not true of all of my friends. 

However, this year I'm joined by someone who really DOES rack up a lot of plays of his favorites. Martin Griffiths, better known here on BGG by his username qwertymartin, plays a LOT of short card games and quite a few of his meatier favorites, too. In fact, he flat-out plays a TON of games. Unlike me, he's not including online plays, either--these are all face-to-face plays (like Davebo will respect!).

That's not the only reason I asked Martin to join me, though. He thinks deeply about games, and writes in-depth analyses of them. Besides the conversations he & his insightful buddies have on their GameChat League, Martin keeps a blog you should be reading, QWERTYUIOP, and has recently re-launched his contest for the best written game reviews, Voice of Experience. If that's not enough, check out the Cult of the Critical guild, where I believe he's a charter member.

It comes through in his writing, and Martin's own user profile has several key elements that resonate with me. Knizian elegance, Chicago Express over Le Havre, and shorter card games? Sign me up! When you get to his mini-editorial about his dissatisfaction with recent 'mainstream' euros, I feel I've found a kindred spirit! Too bad he lives halfway around the world from me. 

Opener: Geeklists for the podcast Season 12, my Extra appearances, and Session Reports

   

Just a solo show this time, something like the old "Session Report & Feedback" episodes I used to do. I wanted to get something out relatively quickly, before I make my move to France. This fit the bill, and it also let me get a show out with better sound quality. (My switch to a Mac has presented me with some challenges to the multi-person shows, whether over Skype or in the same room. I'll figure it out.)

   

It didn't take too much thought to come up with a unifying idea for this episode: changes. Of course my big change is the temporary relocation to France, which will have unknown impacts to my hobby. The other changes are to this podcast, which happened already--new shows are posted to the same old audio feed, but on the web they're at a slightly different location, in my Season 12 geeklist. You should subscribe to that. Also my "Extras" geeklist, which is where you'll find my guest spots on other podcasts and video shows. Finally, if you like this session report episode, then you really should be subscribing to my (mostly) weekly session reports that I post in geeklist form on BGG. Got all of that? Good!

The other changes I note are to the hobby itself. While those things can be a consternation to old farts like me, who still think in terms of email lists and 1990s German Games, these are clearly changes for the better. We sure seem to have more people playing games than ever. If Kickstarter products and mini-filled "thematic" games aren't my favorite things, I can at least agree that this rising tide is lifting all of our boats. I think so, anyway. Kickstarter produced a nice Medici reprint, and you can get more 1990s German than that! My local Barnes & Noble already had a decent game section, and now hosts a monthly public game night. The other day I went to Target to buy a game for my brother's family, and while there I was amazed at that the second-largest retailer in the US has Hanabi, Magic Labyrinth, Rolling America, Ticket to Ride, Spyfall, Qwixx, Codenames, Evolution, Catan, Machi Koro, Betrayal at House on the Hill, Forbidden Island, Dixit, Sheriff of Nottingham, King of Tokyo, and Pandemic. Probably even a few more of "our games" that I missed. Wow!

Closer: The mainstreaming of our hobby at places like Target and Barnes & Noble.

-Mark

Opener: Startups

Closers: Wargames To Go (French & Indian War)

It's mid-October, which means it's time for my annual "Essen Anticipation" episode. I may have missed a year or two along the way, but mostly I've been doing these since I started the podcast in 2005. Along the way I think I've learned more about my own preferences, and have gotten better at homing in on just those games that will end up being some of my favorites or keepers for the year. But I'm not THAT good. I still get excited and list a lot more games than will end up being my hits of the year. Even more than I will get a chance to play soon. That's ok--this is part of the fun of the hobby, at least for me: getting excited about new games, new ideas, new (and old!) designers/publishers.

-Mark

Opener: Bohnanza Das Duell

A solo episode where I get to tell stories about Essen 2016 and reflect on my own experiences there. If you followed my Twitter feed during or after the event (on my blog), you may already know what I'm going to say.

If you've listened to my podcast for a while, you know that I like taking the long view of our hobby, looking back a decade or more to gain more context about what's happening now. In this case, I have my own personal long view to take, since I was at Essen once before, back in 2003. That was before I had a podcast, yet I still reflected on my experience in an online magazine article. I've recently re-posted that article on my blog here at BGG.

I don't think it's the best aspect of our hobby, but it's undeniable that "show us the loot" photos and lists are part of the Essen experience. There's more buying than playing at this event, as far as I can tell. Ok, here are mine:

Land in Zicht! (Dutch version of Entdecker), Saint Malo, Mont Saint Michel, Airborne Commander, Evolution The Beginning, Hanabi promo, Happy Salmon, Astronuts, Visby, Fünf Gurken, Romans Go Home!, misc game bits, Port Royal Unterwegs!, Jolly & Roger, Camel Up Cards, Las Vegas Card Game, X Nimmt!, Bohnanza Das Duell, Futschikato, Twins, Honshu, HMS Dolores, and my Spiel coffee mug!

Closer: Light/Short/Couples Game Group in Paris


-Mark

Openers: Innovation Deluxe and Ethnos

Closers: Can a designer be their own developer? and How to leave feedback for this podcast.

One Year Purge (blog)

Regular guest of the podcast, Greg Pettit, set out to reduce his collection size. Just about all boardgamers can relate--running out of storage space, and not getting your old favorites to the table. Unlike most of us, though, he put this downsizing under a microscope, writing about it each month for a blog/geeklists that tracked his progress. More than that, they contemplated the progress. In this way, did he "murder his hope," or did he refocus on the joy this hobby can bring? That's what we talk about.

-Mark

Today isn't even really a "day" at BGG.con. Most people sleep in (after late nights), then wake up, check out, and are heading home. That might have been me, too. The thing is, I'm not really a late night/sleep in kind of person. Definitely not the up-til-5am, sleep-til-noon variety. Not even the 2am/9am type of gamer, which was my pattern for most of the week. This time, on the last day, I wanted to try two new things, as a trial run for how I'd try to do more of BGG.con next year, if I'm lucky enough to return.

First, I got up "early." At a convention, that means 8am. I was in the main game room by 8:30, where a small subset of gamers were already playing games. (Some guessed they were STILL playing games, but this didn't look like the allnighter crowd.)

Second, I sat down at a table, set my game up (Hellweg westfalicus), and put up one of those "players wanted" flags the convention provides to help you get a game started. Within 5 minutes I had one player, and before I'd even really started the rules explanation we had a third. That was a good number, so off we went. I'm sure we could've gotten a fourth to fill out the game if we'd wanted to, but three is usually a good number for Schacht's games. Neither guy knew me or my podcast, we just sat down to learn a game together. I liked it quite a bit, another liked it, too, while our third player was less enthused. I think of it as a cousin to Hansa, overland in theme, and with a little more going on. (I really love Hansa, but understand how it can be pretty spare for some folks.)

In this last episode from the actual BGG.con, Greg prompted me to write down five things that I felt were highlights of the event. My own personal highlights. If you've been listening over the past few days, they probably won't surprise you. Thinking about it (and in no particular order), I thought mine were

1. The friends
2. The library
3. The BBQ
4. The Flea Markets (both kinds)
5. The Spiel des Jahres seminar

I hope to go back again! Thanks to all who told me they enjoyed my podcasts. That really meant a lot to me. It's no exaggeration to say that feedback like that is the reason I'm still doing it. :)

Scott Alden

@Aldie

Opener: Everyone knows Aldie, right? Feels like we do. Scott Alden, the man behind BoardGameGeek, is one creative entrepreneur, let me tell ya. Anyone could've thought to make a central website where boardgamers come for information and community, but it takes more than a good idea for something to be reality. For 25 years Aldie has been adding features, listening to comments, growing the hobby, and doing way more than most to enhance boardgaming around the world. I can't believe it's been so long since I've had him on the podcast. I'll be sure to do it again soon.

                          

Here Scott joins me to talk about the BGG Hall of Fame, where 25 famous titles were inducted into an inaugural collection. Jennifer Schlickbernd headed up the project with Aldie's blessing, and Candice Harris was responsible producing & editing the awesome videos that accompanied this launch. I was pleased to be invited to be the initial jury that came up with the games, and also pleased with the end result. We each had our own experiences & different appreciations for various titles, but it was a group effort--including much group deliberation--that resulted in the final list.


Schacht The Monkey con
After the interview, I go on to talk about most of the games I played at a recent, regional convention: EsCon. The games all have one thing in common--they were all designed by Michael Schacht. As long as my friends are onboard, I really have fun focusing on something at events like these. Sometimes it's SdJ winners, or trick-taking games, or pre-2000 boardgames. This time it was focused on a single designer. As EsCon host Steve Paap likes to label these things, we called it our Schacht The Monkey con.

            

Closer: The following month's episode will be this podcast's own 20th anniversary. Can you believe it? Dave Arnott will be on to interview me and I can tell stories (some old, some new) about the past two decades behind a laptop and inexpensive microphone. If you've got questions or otherwise want to me to talk about something, send in your feedback now. Thanks.

-Mark

December 30, 2021

There were enough good feelings about the previous episode (both my own directly, plus your feedback) that I felt compelled to squeeze in one more episode before the year is out. So this podcast "season" can claim multiple episodes!

It's just me this time, rambling on about the year that's just passed. It's not exactly a recap of my games played, though there's some of that. Nor is it about the pandemic we're still living through, though there's some of that, too. It's just what my own 2021 was like for boardgaming. A lot of online gaming before the vaccinations meant we could game together, in-person again...but then some disappointment that we still aren't gaming across a real table as often as before. Perhaps 2022 will be better yet. We shall see.

Nonetheless, between online and in-person plays again, I really did get in some good totals this year. My quick numbers are 80 different titles a total of 126 times...and that's only counting in-person plays. I used to include online plays, which would bump that up to 135 & 291, very similar to the 100/300 numbers I would typically get in the years before the pandemic. So while it feels to me like I did less gaming in 2021 than I'd like, the numbers say that I'm doing as well as ever.

-Mark

Micro-episode for the next round of voting. 

Vote here! https://boardgamegeek.com/geeklist/328714/boardgames-go-season-20-2024?itemid=10561730&commentid=12070025#comment12070025

Have you seen the latest video project on BGG? It's called GameNight!, literally hosted (i.e. in their home) by Lincoln Damerst & Nikki Pontius, as well digitally hosted by Scott Alden on BoardgameGeek's YouTube channel. On this podcast I got to talk with both Scott and Lincoln about GameNight!. At the time of recording they'd put out one show, but by now there are three episodes up.

http://www.boardgamegeek.com/blogpost/15465/bgtg-132-gamenight-with-scott-alden-and-lincoln

I pushed back an interview show I have coming next* in order to open the 15th year(!) of this podcast with a solo episode. In it, I reflect a little on the podcast and (re)tell some stories about it. Then I launch into a LONG list of games I've managed to play at three recent events: EsCon 2019, SoCal Games Day #76, and an extended weekend boardgame cruise with some buddies. In those events I played a mix of old favorites, some new-to-me superfillers like I prefer, a few longer games, and some that have some hype/hotness about them. See? Even I play those trendy titles sometimes, kickstarted or not. As you'll hear, I sometimes like them!


Opener: Stories about the podcast

Closer: I always say, "Thanks for listening," and today I mean that more than ever. I wouldn't keep doing the podcast if not for the positive feedback I receive from my audience. You all make it worth the labor of love.

-Mark

* Spoiler alert! It's with David Harding, the designer/publisher behind Grail Games.

I know a lot of Daves, and many of them have been on my podcast. With that in mind they're helping me celebrate a new holiday, Davecember, when each of them joins for me a mini-episode sprinkled randomly this month into your feed. I'll ask each of them similar questions, and each David also gets a bit of time to bring up something they want to share with my listeners. Enjoy!

 

David Corbin joins us next, doubling our count of North Carolina based Davids...but he's not our last. He comes offering David's Aphorism, as well as David's Dictum. Heady stuff...

-Mark

Bigger & better than a couple years ago, a bunch of my BGGcon buddies joined me around the microphone at an outdoor brewery table. We'd been to the Hard 8 bbq place frequented by gamers, then headed over to the Grapevine Craft Brewery. There we relaxed with a few beers and recorded some thoughts about games we'd been playing. (We even played a few games of Insider.)

You'll hear Zak, Brian, Steve #1, Steve #2, Marcin, DaveO, Eryn, Travis, Greg, Rick, Ryan, and me talk about Magic Maze, Civilization: A New Dawn, Heaven & Ale, Majesty:For The Realm, TransAtlantic, Santa Maria, Calimala, Nusfjord, Merlin, Istanbul Dice Game, Mountains of Madness, and Azul. 

-Mark

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

As he's done for the past few years, Greg Pettit joins me on the podcast to talk about the annual Boardgamegeek convention, BGG.con (do they still call it "dot con"? I always thought that was clever.) I didn't go to the convention. In fact, I've only made it to the first one, and I hear it's only gotten bigger & better since then. Greg, on the other hand, goes every year. I really need to make it back sometime. 

Occurring the week/weekend before Thanksgiving here in America, the convention is timed to include a lot of brand new Essen titles in its famous game library. Even I might succumb to the "cult of the new" a little bit when presented with the opportunity to try so many brand new, exciting titles that have barely made it to this country yet. Greg is like that, too, and it's great to talk with him afterward about so many of these brand new games. With that in mind, I can chime in on a few new titles I've managed to play somehow, even though I didn't make it to the convention.

For this show, Greg and I prepared a Geeklist to go along with it. This was for our own notes & preparation, but we found in prior years that it's fun to share with everyone. I always like comments here on the blog, but you may want to comment about individual games over on that listt. Towards the very end of the show, we also take a brief look back at our similar list from the previous year, too. Though we don't spend too much time on them, you know that I'm always fascinated with analyzing or merely reflecting upon what makes some games longterm keepers, and which ones we're finished with in less than twelve months. In some cases that's completely ok to have "short-term games" like that, but mostly I'm interested in those permanent keepers. 

David Arnott

@Arnott

When did you start listening to podcasts? Do you remember your first ones? For me it was the first one ever about boardgames and the first about movies. That was Geekspeak and Reel Reviews. Even though I'm not so into wine, Grape Radio was another super early one for me. The medium was new, the tech was unfamiliar, and I loved the chance to listen to interesting audio on my commute, about unique subjects. Although those earliest shows seemed to use a lot of fancy, expensive equipment, I wondered if a more basic podcast could be produced with simple gear. On March 3, 2005, I threw my hat in the ring with Boardgames To Go, a new audio version of my blog of the same name. The response was quick & positive, so I kept at it. Two decades later, I'm still here.

Twenty years is an important milestone for me. I never really saw myself doing the podcast this long. I've averaged about 18 episodes per year over that time, including some early bursts of productivity and a few longer gaps. After the pandemic I renewed my commitment to the podcast and have stuck with a first-of-the-month schedule ever since, plus some bonus episodes along the way. My audience grew, then plateaued, then settled into a longstanding core of listeners. It's no exaggeration to say that you folks are the reason I've kept at it. I appreciate [your appreciation & encouragement, and I've enjoyed meeting some of you in-person.

This month you'll have to indulge me talking podcast history, motivation, and a little future planning. I can't help it. Longtime friend Dave Arnott talks through it with me, and we may not refer to a single game title! Don't worry--there will be more game titles than you can shake a stick at soon (hint: Mark Madness).

One of the only photos I have of me recording the podcast. This was from way back in 2006, when Dave & I recorded an episode about Vinci. We were at SoCal Games Day at the time, upstairs at the Burbank Moose Lodge. You may be able to see that I just have my laptop nearby, with a "Y-cable" audio splitter allowing us both to have headset mics piped into it. That's as fancy as I ever was for this podcast.

-Mark

Opener: Whoops! I recorded this little episode so quickly that I completely forgot about my new Opener/Closer framework! Ok, let's say that the opener was my intro en français. Vive la France!

The shortest episode I've done in a while, this is to "clear the decks" of boardgame session reporting before I do my traditional Essen Anticipation episode in a week or so. This year I'm going to the event, at least for the most crowded part of the weekend, and I'll be doing both Pre-Essen and Post-Essen episodes. That's the plan.

In the meantime, what have I been playing lately? Not as much in France as I'd hoped, but a special opportunity let me try one new game. Add to that the games I played at my last visit home to California for a long while.

Closer: Actually, I kind of had a closer, I just forgot to set it aside as such. At the end I mention how new Essen titles can sometimes show up in online versions, contemporary or soon after the Spiel event itself. Are there any of these for 2016? I haven't noticed, but should look harder.

-Mark

We all know last year's event was cancelled due to covid, but late in 2021 BGGcon was back on! I ended up having to cancel my own plans to attend, but "every-timer" Greg Pettit was there. And he's back on my podcast to discuss. What a good reason to finally issue another episode!

February 1, 2022

Let me see about keeping this going. It's been a long while since I had anything approaching a regular posting schedule. No promises, but for my own sake I'd like to (re)start boardgaming and podcasting a little more often...

Opener: Five Games For Doomsday podcast

As I explained in the previous episode, I'm not yet living in a post-pandemic world. None of us are. Things have not gone back to normal. Not even "the new normal." At least, I hope not--I hope things can get a bit better, more stable, and more social than they are for me at the moment.

My boardgaming hobby is therefore in a hybrid state. Sort of like how we talk about "hybrid meetings" at my work where some people are in the office, but most are at home on their screens--my boardgaming is a mix. Much of it is still with friends (and some random people) on sites like BoardgameArena, Yucata.de, and Brettspielwelt. Other times just two or three of us manage to meet in-person for a real game night over a table, with drinks & snacks. I want the latter to take over my hobby again, but we aren't quite there yet.

Consequently, the games I discuss are a blend of ones played with friends across a table, and others played with friends on a screen. As always, I have thoughts, opinions, and questions about the games regardless of the medium.

My main thoughts are about The Adventures of Robin Hood, the Spiel des Jahres nominee from last year (in the podcast I mistakenly say Kennerspiel nominee). The story of Robin Hood is ok, I suppose, but what impresses me is the physical gameplay design of this one. I'm sure there are many great examples of this concept, but I struggled to find a good description or list anywhere. I don't just mean the bits, and I definitely don't mean sculpted miniatures (thankfully, this game doesn't have those). No, I mean gameplay that relates to the physical act of manipulating the boardgame as an object. Dexterity games do this, but they're in a different category. I mean strategy games that do this. I'd love to find more examples.

Images by Tobias Franke & Henk Rolleman

Surprising to me, thoughts about this game leaked over into thoughts about solo boardgaming in general--why I don't like it, even though I love solo wargaming. Next I play pop psychologist on myself to connect this feeling about solo boardgames to my waning interest in fiction...if I'm consuming it alone. Nonfiction is my solo experience, while I want to enjoy fictional stories/shows/games with friends & family.

Other games discussed are Isle of Cats, Bosk, So Clover!, and LaCorsa.

Closer: The game design of Wordle

-Mark

Opener: Saint Malo

The gig in France that allowed me to go to Essen last month has a downside--I had to cancel my plans to attend BGGcon. I'd attended the big event in Dallas last two years and was eager to make a third year in a row. Instead, I had to skip it this time, and follow remotely like so many others in the hobby.

 

(Gregarius)

 

Dave OConnor

(daveo1234)

 

Ryan Wheeler

(Ryan Wheeler)

 

Spielgeek.com

(elschmear)

 

Rick Byrens

(civplayer)

 

Luckily, my buddies were willing to take a break from their fun to record a long-distance podcast with me. While they were being night owls at BGGcon's Saturday night, I woke up early in France to dial in. Several of them gathered around an iPhone and told me about their time at the event. Greg Pettit always does this with me (and that's still an upcoming episode), and he took the reins to direct a meta-conversation about BGGcon itself. Later we wrapped up with some specific game recommendations.

Closer: Light/Short/Couples Game Group in Paris, combined with Joueurs Anonymes at the Anticafé Beaubourg


-Mark

Opener: Daybreak

   

Last year was a great year of boardgaming for me. Apparently I played more games than ever, whether you include online plays or not. In this episode I go over the ones I played the most, the ones I liked the most, and some topics other than titles themselves. Like...gaming events I attended, others I'm aiming for in 2024, my excitement for the growing library of "history games," and how I'm still unsatisfied that boardgames haven't built as much connection to travel or place as they could.

Closer: Mark Madness is coming back for 2024, and last year's champion Patrick Pence is helping me! We want your suggestions for divisions & games to go up against each other.

-Mark

Opener: Reef

Closers: Games with Heidelberg, such as Thurn & Taxis, Web of Power, or Wallenstein (what did I forget?)

The famous Spiel game fair in Essen, Germany starts later this week. I won't be there, but that's nothing new. Like most of us, I window-shop this gathering from afar, and participate vicariously via blogs, videos, and (maybe most of all) getting excited for its arrival. Just over a week ago I commented on Twitter that I hadn't looked at the list of games at all. That was echoed by some who thought I might be "over" the buzz and hype of Essen.

I'm not. Not really.

True, I don't get quite as deep into the research and anticipation of the many games coming out. But that's mostly because it's impossible to sort through that much information about so many new games. The dynamic listing here on BGG tops a thousand titles in the database for Essen 2018. I used everyone else's anticipating (i.e. thumbs) as a guide to look through over a hundred games myself, whittling that down to about 25 that catch my eye in some way. Those are the games depicted above, and the ones I discuss in the podcast.

-Mark

Opener: Bukiet (Bloom)

Closer: BGG's new look

This isn't the first time I've attended the Origins Game Fair, one of the United States' larger national game conventions. But my previous times were once in the 1990s...and once in the 1980s! As far as we're concerned, that's a completely different era. It was before the current wave of boardgames, even before CCGs had their wave. Now in 2019 the event was dominated by our style of boardgaming, with a subset of CCGs, RPGs, and wargaming around the edges.

Those other times I attended Origins was back when it moved around--different cities in different years. I went when it was local to me, and I only went for a day or two. Now, of course, the event has its permanent home at the Columbus, Ohio convention center. To get there I had to fly cross-country, staying with friends in a rented apartment for an extended weekend. In fact, these were friends I barely knew before Origins. I knew David already, and his other two buddies I met over Skype. It's another example of what's so great about this hobby, the good people.

Partway through our time at Origins, these newfound friends & I gathered around my iPad to record our thoughts. The audio is good enough, I think. Like I always enjoy, we had some meta conversation about the convention itself, the venue, people, and overall experience. Then we dive into the games themselves. The funny thing is that we played a bunch of older games, not all new stuff. I swear I'm not responsible for this (not entirely)! These guys were as excited to play some older titles as the new hotness. We had some of both, as you'll hear (or see below).

Wednesday (travel day): Red7, Wildlands, Blood Red Skies, El Grande, Imhotep, The King is Dead, Railroad Ink, The Mind, No Thanks

Thursday: Tigris & Euphrates, Silver & Gold, Ringmaster, Museum, Exit (Catacombs of Horror), Cockroach Poker, LAMA

Friday: War Chest, Keltis Way of the Stones, Musketeers, Piepmatz, Wingspan

Saturday: Gnomopolis, Undaunted: Normandy, unpublished prototype, Shifty Eyed Spies

-Mark

It's the Elite Eight! Get your votes in before March 24 at https://boardgamegeek.com/geeklist/328714/boardgames-go-season-20-2024?itemid=10561730&commentid=12079786#comment12079786

Opener: Ark Nova...on BoardgameArena

I feel like most of this year--really everything since BGGcon last November--has been about me embracing the fullness of this hobby in a post-pandemic way. Along with the realization that no one can really embrace ALL of it. There's just too much. I've simultaneously been maximizing my hobby and realizing the unavoidable limitations involved.

This episode certainly fits that overall "story arc." In May I managed to play a lot of games with various friends in all sorts of settings: my local game group, on a business trip, at a Games Day, during a lunch hour at work, online in several ways, and more. Plus there's the extra parts of our hobby, like podcasts and magazines. Looking back, I feel like I did a LOT. Even so, I'm aware of the things I didn't do, because there's just so much time in a month. At least several of those opportunities were with a wider range of gaming friends, something that wasn't possible a year or two ago.

Closer: Spiel des Jahres nominations and recommendations

Mike Siggins

@sumo

Welcome to 2023, which happens to be the 19th season of my little podcast, Boardgames To Go. I'm as surprised as anyone to still be around, still with listeners. I do enjoy this, and greatly appreciate my small & loyal following. I'm thrilled to start the new season with a wonderful guest, Mike Siggins talking about his Sumo picks.

The Sumos 2022
Yokozuna

Ark Nova

Ozeki

Akropolis | Brian Boru | Shinkansen | Vienna Connection

Sekiwake

1923: Cotton Club | Magnate | Railroad Revolution | Rise | War of the Ring: Card Game

Tainted Sumos

Etherfields (Sekiwake) | ISS Vanguard (Yokozuna)


Wargame Sumos

Dawn's Early Light (Yokozuna)


Bayonets & Tomahawks | Fire & Stone | Plains Indian Wars | The Shores of Tripoli | Two Minutes to Midnight

Probably everyone who listens to my podcast already knows about Siggins. He was even on my show four times before, but the last was a full 15 years ago! As you'll hear us say, we suspected it was longer ago than we'd like to remember.

However, my interest in Mike Siggins goes back further than that, way before this podcast. My entry into this hobby is closely tied to Siggins, thanks to his Sumo magazine that was transcribed onto the internet by Ken Tidwell (which reminds me...I've always wanted to interview Ken for the podcast. Perhaps in 2023?). Siggins wrote about games with a critic's analysis and writer's flair, whetting my appetite for games I'd never seen or heard of. And then there was this amazing thing called Essen that he wrote about. I was doing all of this reading in the late mid/late 90s, and Mike was writing in the early 90s. Possibly even 1989. Amazing!

He's seen & played so many games. At one point he nearly burned out, and there's the story of his famous collection-purge from hundreds or thousands of games down to just 50. He's still playing lots of games, including lots of new ones. Every year he names ten or so of them as his own personal top picks of the year: the Sumos. For the year just passed, 2022, I get the honor to host him talking about them and sharing the list with you. Near the end of the program I also share my own list of notable games in 2022, though some were published earlier.


Mark's noteworthy games of 2022

Boardgame: Cascadia

Card game: Targi & Scout

Party game: Just One

Wargame: Cuba The Splendid Little War

Online game: Memoir '44 / Azul / Wingspan


It was a fun conversation and I hope you like it. I don't intend to let another 15 years pass before I get Siggins back on the podcast. A request has been made to discuss euro-wargame hybrids again, which I may just morph a little bit into a discussion of a new style of easier, introductory history games that are taking off on both sides of the Atlantic.

-Mark

Opener: I should've made it more clear in the audio, but the obvious opener is that I will be going Essen this year, and you can find me on Saturday afternoon at the NorthStarGames booth, Hall 3 P-103. It’s near a corner by a restaurant, and the same hall where Amigo, Z-Man, Pegasus, Stronghold, and others are. Please stop by and tell me if you listen to the podcast. I'll also be around on Saturday morning and all of Sunday, just taking it all in myself. I'm not wearing a BGTG shirt or anything, so just try to keep a lookout for this guy.

Woo-hoo! After work on Friday I hop a train to Essen! I'll arrive after Spiel closes for the evening, but hope to see some folks that evening. Then on Saturday & Sunday I get to take it all in. I'm buying a few things, but mostly I just want to experience the spectacle of it all. I was last there (my only other time) for a single day in 2003. I wrote an article about that experience for an online magazine of the time, The Games Journal. It's still there, with a photo of a younger me.


Now it's over a dozen years later, and I have the opportunity to go back. What am I excited to see? Everything, really, but for podcast purposes I made a list of a "baker's dozen" games that most pique my interest. These lists are typically personal--lists by others feature different games, and you may find some of my choices curious. You can just listen along, of course, but I've also recorded these in a geeklist. Check it out. Here's what I wrote on that list about my "process" for picking games.

            

Full list including many more Honorable Mentions, and some additional comments on my geeklist.

Closer: It's too long to call my honorable mentions the closer, so I guess that means it's the part where I talk about how Mars games aren't automatically on my list. Almost the opposite, really. Does it work that way for you? Is your day job uninteresting as a game subject? I think it's because we know too much about our own jobs, and any game about them falls short...but if they include all of that detail, it's too much! (Plus, it becomes work again.)

-Mark

Opener: Nothing specific, since I discuss so many titles during the episode

Closer: Check out the Gravity Assist podcast that includes an interview with the project scientist for "my" spacecraft heading for Mars right now.

Perhaps foolishly, I'm posting my thoughts about the Spiel des Jahres nominees just a few hours before the actual winner in announced in Germany. Well, no matter. You may have already heard some of my thoughts about these games (as well as the Kennerspiel nominees) on a recent episode of the video series Game Night! here on BGG. On my own podcast I get to say a bit more about all of them.

I've always liked retrospective analysis of games, and here I do a little near the end, looking back five years to the Spiel and Kenner nominees for 2013. Do you remember what those were? What do you think of those picks now?

At long last, here are the Top Ten! As we count them down in reverse order, we stay true to form--having a few personal grumbles about these amazing titles. At the same time, we're honestly respectful and enthusiastic for all of these games. Several of them are in our personal top ten lists, too. 

Though this is the end of the list of 100 Great Games, it's not quite the end of this podcast series. We promise to come back one more time for an epilogue episode, one that shares some analysis of the overall list, considers what games only missed the list because they were released post-2012, and what our own votes were. Remember, this list is a compilation of many experienced gamers' input. By now it's pretty obvious that we each have our own personal tastes that differ somewhat. If you have topics you'd like us to cover in the epilogue, let us know.

In my poll associated with the last installment of 100 Great Games, I asked for your favorite Knizia auction game. Of the many options available Ra came out as the clear favorite. As you may have heard last time, Stephen preferred Ra, I went with Medici, and Jackson picked Traumfabrik.

Now that we've reached the top of the list of 100 Great Games, are there ones you thought we missed? Of course that will be true--everyone has different tastes. However, any game released after 2012 didn't even get a chance to be on this list because that's when the project started. Below I've put together a poll of notable titles less than two years old that might have made it onto the 100 Great Games list. It's a tough choice, but which one do you think would've made it on the list? As always, if you've got a good suggestion that's not included in the poll, write it in the comments below. Thanks.

The Championship is now set!

https://boardgamegeek.com/geeklist/354557/mark-madness-2025-game-cover-art-with-eryn-roston

Openers:
Mark - BGTG Madness!
Greg - LLAMA on BGA

@Gregarius

Longtime friend of the podcast Greg Pettit returns to talk about thrifting boardgames. What is that? It's a hobby-within-a-hobby about finding used games at thrift shops, garage sales, and other sources of secondhand titles. To get good results you should be dedicated to doing this, checking locations regularly because on any given day there's likely to be nothing good. However, from time to time you may be fortunate enough to find a game you'd love to add to your own collection, or else one that you could use for parts. If you're like me when I used to do this, you're happy to sell the game on ebay, BGG Geekmarket, Facebook Marketplace, or some other venue...and then use the proceeds to buy other games. :-)

Greg tells about the thrifters guild here on BGG, TheThriftyGamer.net website/utility, and the vicarious thrill and congratulations that go on regularly through the Thrift Finds of the Week.

For some serious thrifters, they acquire more games than they can really utilize, so what they like to do is give them away to good homes. Isn't that cool? Related to that concept is the notion of the Thrifty Secret Santa annual gift exchange. Greg stepped in to run this over a decade ago, and has been doing it ever since with the assistance of some helper "elves." It's a wonderful tradition where games are exchanged for the holidays, but no one buys anything. In particular, no one send a gift just by clicking an order button online from a wishlist. Instead, used games are being exchanged from the heart, often accompanied with a lot of personal craftsmanship and care in the gift-giving. I have yet to participate myself, being content to watch from the sidelines as people enjoy the sending and receiving. But with some encouragement and demystification from Greg, perhaps podcast listeners and I may want to be a part of it next year.


Closers:
Greg - Tigris & Euphrates tournament for the Old-School German Style Games Guild
Mark - Mandala and "upgrading" a game's components to play outside

-Mark

I'll be attending Origins Game Fair this year (June 2019) in Columbus. I've been there before, but only in the 80s & 90s, so I'm sure it's substantially different now. I'll be there Thursday-Sunday, including participating on a panel of wargame podcasters/YouTubers/bloggers Sunday morning. That's listed in the program as shown below. I think it's free, and although it's about wargaming you may want to stop by anyway. The topic is the current "golden age" of the hobby, and part of what I have to say is how there are more euro-wargame crossover titles now. Some good aspects of euro design & production have made their way into wargames. I'm thinking of titles like Memoir '44, Twilight Struggle, Academy Games' 1754/1775/1812 series, A Few Acres of Snow, and so on.

Whether you attend the panel or not, I'm happy to hand out my little BoardgamesToGo and WargamesToGo buttons to listeners. Just track me down and I should have some onhand to give away. I'll mostly be doing open gaming, I think. Drop me a note on Twitter or geekmail if you like.

Opener: Silver & Gold

Closer: SdJ jury comments
• Dale Yu's 2009 interview with Tom Werneck at Opinionated Gamers
• Harald Schrapers and other jury members

It's Spiel des Jahres season. That means the speculation has happened, the actual nominees & recommended titles have been announced, and now we're just waiting on the final prizewinning selection. This doesn't matter to many people--in fact many gamers don't think it's a big deal. But it's a big deal to me and here's why: I'm a hobby gamer from way, way back. Like four decades. If you think hobby gaming is niche now, you have no recollection of what an odd corner it was in back then. Stereotyped as being full of nerdy boys and grumpy old men, that was kind of true. Game shops did not smell good. Mature romances and stable careers were hard to find.

Now, those people are still around--and they deserve their hobby, too--but I find it FAR better today that we have more diverse game groups filled with everyday people doing everyday jobs. Interesting games are on sale in bookstores, at Target, and of course online. Not everything has to have an orc in it. I don't know if the hobby IS bigger & broader, but it sure feels that way.

True, these improvements may have come around on their own. After all, formerly geeky entertainments like Game of Thrones and Marvel comics now dominate our cultural landscape. Perhaps hobby games would've developed on their own. I don't think so, however. Or, at least, it all happened much faster (and--importantly--across a broader audience) because a group of game reviewers in Germany took artistic criticism of gaming as an artform seriously. They drove their publishers to do better, and in turn the publishers were rewarded with increased business. It was a positive cycle, and we are some of its lucky recipients.

There are a lot of awards thought up & given out by all sorts of organizations. There have been some in America for decades. Yet they didn't have this impact. In fact, there were other awards in Germany, too. The Spiel des Jahres has worked like no others because it has been cultivated & maintained by a dedicated, revolving collection of game critics. Even if the lighter, more family-focused games aren't your favorites, you still benefit from their polishing of the games business. For someone like me, it's even better because I honestly love many of the titles that have won the Spiel des Jahres.

I don't love ALL of them, though. Not even close. As you'll hear, I'd say I love about a third, like another third, and don't like the final third. Close to that. This episode is a ranking of all 40 of the SdJ winners, and (briefly) what I think of them.

-Mark

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Greg Pettit returns to the topic of narrative themes in boardgames, except that it's mostly Mark that needs to unload his true feelings about geeky versus historical themes.

http://www.boardgamegeek.com/blogpost/12349/

The round of 32 is finished, leaving us now voting on the Sweet 16 of game cover artworks. The choices are getting more difficult.

And we have a new leader in our prediction contest. #Davecember celebrity loofish is representing his namesakes with a currently-in-first-place position for his guess...but with others on his tail.

Opener: Playing games with the "correct" player count (e.g. Disney Villainous)


The last two episodes have been a look back. Back at my entire time in the hobby, and also back at the first Top Ten list of favorite games I ever made. It was fun for me to reflect on those titles, finding how many of them I still enjoy. But admittedly, it featured a lot of old games. I think the NEWEST game on that list was twenty years old!

Now I wanted to make more of an effort to talk about some recent games I enjoy. Because the truth is that I play new games all the time. I'm not a Cult of the New guy, but between my own purchases and those of my buddies, we still fill most game nights with one or more titles that are new to us. I've long maintained that encountering a new game is a significant aspect to the hobby--especially among the most avid hobbyists. I'm not so different. In theory I'd also like to be part of "the conversation" about whatever is topical in our hobby, but in practice I'm usually behind that curve.

When I set out to make a list of these recent games I like, I first thought in terms of the past decade. Or just take it back to 2010, to use a round number. Fortunately, everyone around me laughed me out of the room, saying that a dozen years ago isn't anyone's idea of "recent." So I tried harder, limiting myself to games released in the past five years. So that's 2017. It's the best I could do. Then I heard the recommendation to include another gamer friend who's much more focused on the latest releases. Brian Murray has been on my podcast before, but it's been a while. Now I was super glad to have him onhand to share his top five recent games, and he went MUCH more contemporary than I did.

We wrapped up by sharing our honorable mentions. Brian mentioned Lost Ruins of Arnak, Cataclysm, Res Arcana, Faiyum, and Viscounts of the West Kingdom, while I also included Just One, War Chest, The Mind, Belratti, Little Town, and The Adventures of Robin Hood.


Closer: Not relocating, and vaccines are working, so I'm looking forward to some gaming events.

-Mark

Today was a full day where I'd planned almost nothing ahead of time. A full day of gaming, right? Actually, it turned out that I played very FEW games today, but had a whole day of fun nonetheless. We had our little BGTG/WGTG lunch at the hotel, I watched Artemis, went out for Texas BBQ dinner, watched the "World Series," and spent some time relaxing with friends at the hotel bar. Oh, and I also got to play Deus, Doodle City, Port Royal, and almost a game of Isaribi. (Hope to get in a real of game of that last one tomorrow.)

Openers:
• Orbital
• Pikoko

Chris Marling

(hairyarsenal)

 

Game designer, blogger, and real-life journalist Chris Marling joins me once again to talk about Essen. As he did two years ago, he had a new game launching at Spiel, so we get to hear about that. But he's also an enthusiastic game hobbyist like the rest of us, and he also talks about the event itself from that point of view. Chris loves the game fair, and has been going for quite a number of years. From that perspective, he's able to notice some shifts & changes in the hobby that affect the world's largest boardgame event itself. We talk about those, too.

Chris was there, in part, to help launch his new game, Witless Wizards. If you were there, perhaps you saw him, played a demo with him, or got your copy signed. He came home with a lot of new games, as always, and by now he's had a chance to play most of them. (Remember, Essen itself is more of a game buying event than one with lots of opportunities for actually playing your purchases.) Chris gathered up ten titles he wanted to talk about for one reason or another. Sometimes because they're great games, sometimes for other reasons. Besides the two games mentioned in our Openers (above), Chris discusses Underwater Cities, Trapwords, Narabi, Orbis, Fool, Discover: Lands Unknown, Crown of Emara, Showtime, Gnomopolis, and The Color Monster.

Closers:
• Downsizing a collection...mission accomplished!
• How does journalism tackle the current game saturation situation?

-Mark

The SECOND micro-episode of the podcast that spreads the news and encourages folks to enter predictions & make votes in a 64-title, single-elimination contest between award-winning boardgames. 

https://boardgamegeek.com/geeklist/312399/boardgames-go-madness-2023-battle-award-winners

Opener: Taverns of Tiefenthal. Plus someone finally got Wingspan online multiplayer right, and it was the BGA team.

I've gone through a few waves of downsizing my game collection. The latest was just a month ago, inspired by a friend's visit to organize my collection. In the process, I felt the ability to let several games go. They haven't been sold off yet, but they're stacked up elsewhere in a for-sale pile, letting me consolidate the games I'm sticking with into fewer shelves.

When I stepped back, I saw that several of the games on the shelf were ones that anyone might have in their collection, while others were more personal choices, oddballs for one reason or another. At least they are less popular, I think. I've collected ten of those titles to talk about in this episode. (That includes one of the games that comes from my spillover collection in a credenza at work.)

I've been thinking about a new top ten of more recent games, but I'm not ready with that. Perhaps that will be in a future show, because there ARE plenty of modern titles that I really enjoy. It would be fun to talk about them, in part to contrast them against the "hotness" on BGG and Kickstarter that I often can't connect with. Again...that's a future show.

In THIS episode I thought my original top ten was worth discussing all over. In some cases they are games I love just as much as ever. Others are more sentimental favorites, not really making it to the table any longer. In a few cases I think the games represented of a type of game that I still enjoy, and there are newer examples.

Closer: The outcome of our Discord polling about “evergreen” games. In contrast, I almost completely forgot about the “Essen anticipation” shows I used to do!



-Mark

I know a lot of Daves, and many of them have been on my podcast. With that in mind they're helping me celebrate a new holiday, Davecember, when each of them joins for me a mini-episode sprinkled randomly this month into your feed. I'll ask each of them similar questions, and each David also gets a bit of time to bring up something they want to share with my listeners. Enjoy!

 

Dave OConnor

@daveo1234

We're winding down now. DaveO is one of the remaining Davids that's still local to me. Local enough. He's near San Diego, I'm near LA, but that's close enough to have seen each other off & on over the years. We met around 20 years ago at a SoCal Games Day, I think. Now he's my roommate at Dice Tower West game convention, and a co-conspirator to bring old favorites to the table at a convention.

-Mark

Get your Sweet Sixteen votes in now! https://boardgamegeek.com/geeklist/328714/boardgames-go-season-20-2024?itemid=10561730&commentid=12074798#comment12074798

Opener: Skipped this part since all we're doing is talking about (mostly new) games played!

Closers: Skipped this, too, but you can think that my suggestion that listeners subscribe & participate in the Boardgames To Go guild as my unofficial closer

 

(Gregarius)

 

[/floatright]Another year that I didn't make it to BGGcon, but of course Greg Pettit did...he's an "every timer"! Since 2010 (a decade, hmm...) Greg and I have been recording this episode after the event, whether I was able to join him or not. Greg tells us about the event, its new location, and then about a whole lot of games played. Even oldtimers like Greg & I find ourselves playing new games as well as some old favorites at an event like this. Since these are often first plays of a new game, I like to solicit "1-5 star ratings" instead of BGG ratings. What's the difference? Maybe nothing, but in my mind, stars are more of a gut feel after an early play that measures excitement to play again, as well as (or maybe more than) an analysis of a game's long-term evaluation. As Greg says, it's easier to give 5 stars to a game you just had fun with than to say it's a 10.


-Mark

Opener: Pack O Game (especially BOO and DIG from Set #2)

Closer: Tabletopia


As you might have seen, I was lucky enough to participate in a few recent episodes of Game Night! when the gang discussed the recent game awards: Spiel des Jahres, Kinderspiel des Jahres, and Kennerspiel des Jahres. Although I was able to share some of my opinions & experiences with the games on those videos, I have more to say on my own podcast...and here it is.

Kennerspiel des Jahres
Raiders of the North Sea nominee
Exit: The Game winner!
Terraforming Mars nominee (and my favorite)

Kinderspiel des Jahres
Captain Silver nominee
Ice Cool winner!
The Mysterious Forest nominee (and my favorite)

Spiel des Jahres
Magic Maze nominee
The Quest for El Dorado nominee
Kingdomino winner! (and my favorite)


-Mark

I know a lot of Daves, and many of them have been on my podcast. With that in mind they're helping me celebrate a new holiday, Davecember, when each of them joins for me a mini-episode sprinkled randomly this month into your feed. I'll ask each of them similar questions, and each David also gets a bit of time to bring up something they want to share with my listeners. Enjoy!

 

David Harding

@huffa2

Another designer joins us, and he's in the game publishing world, too. David Harding of Elevenses, One Zero One, Matcha and Grail Games.

-Mark

I know a lot of Daves, and many of them have been on my podcast. With that in mind they're helping me celebrate a new holiday, Davecember, when each of them joins for me a mini-episode sprinkled randomly this month into your feed. I'll ask each of them similar questions, and each David also gets a bit of time to bring up something they want to share with my listeners. Enjoy!

 

David

@loofish

The next David comes to us from a different part of North Carolina, and explains how the recent hurricane robbed them of power...but gave them a chance to play more analog games with kids.

-Mark

Openers: Root and Krass Kariert

Closers: Playing boardgames solo; Stephen Glenn's tweet about Phase 1 & 2 in our hobby:

[/floatright]

Doug Adams

(dougadamsau)

 

Doug and I have "known" each other via the internet for over twenty years. He, Joe Huber, and I were the three that started emailing each other to form the Desert Island Gamers (DIGers) mailing list that was a main source of boardgaming information before sites like BGG were around. Heck, we go back far enough that we knew each other from IRC chat sessions. Although the distance between California (me) and Australia (Doug) has prevented us from meeting in-person, we've kept up an irregular correspondence for all of those years. Doug was on my wargames podcast a couple years ago, and at that time I knew I had to get him on Boardgames To Go, too. He maintains his wargaming days are mostly behind him, and he's almost exclusively a eurogamer now.

When he dove into his own private, Knizia boardgaming marathon challenge, I knew straight away that this was the topic we'd discuss. Being gamers from way back, I knew he'd be exploring lots of classic Knizia titles from the 1990s. He didn't stop there, though. He played every kind of Knizia game he could, from those early titles that impressed so many of us, through some recent years when Knizia was less visible, all the way up to the present day's "Reinerssance."

Though this challenge was big enough to begin with, Doug kept adding to it as the year went on. Then he managed to actually complete this gargantuan challenge by the end of September. Amazing! I invited him on the podcast to talk about that entire experience, both the Knizia games he enjoyed, and the very nature of personal boardgaming challenges. With the new year coming soon, I bet some other gamers will be inspired to try their own challenges. More power to you.

Be sure to also check out Doug's excellent blog here on BGG, full of great photos and tidbits about the games he plays. It's called Reducing Doug's To Play List, which gives some sense of its general purpose. He posted monthly recaps of his progress through his "Great Knizia Challenge."

A fitting reward for Doug from Dr. Knizia

-Mark

Martin G

(qwertymartin)

Patron Badge for 2009 through 2019

Martin returns to the podcast after five years to talk with me again about the year just passed. This episode we spend less time talking about the raw statistics for our games played, instead having more fun discussing a bunch of "best of" categories for the past year. Best artwork, party game, component, 2-player game, and so on. Fun to reflect on the past year in that way, and there's a special follow-along/participation geeklist for you all to use, as well.



-Mark

Nonsense Junkie

@elschmear

Opener:
• Mark: Caesar's Empire
• Steve: Trendy

My friend Steve Paap joins me again, but this time he turns the tables, interviewing ME on my own podcast. We talk about the history of the podcast, what I think about wargaming, and some of my curmudgeonly tendencies in boardgaming. It was fun to talk about with him, and he claims we only got through half of his questions! Perhaps in another year or so we can try again.

Closers:
• Steve: Competitive tournaments at a game convention
• Mark: Finding other boardgamers at my work


-Mark

Opener: Wayfarers of the South Tigris

David Arnott

@Arnott

Mike Mayer

@Mike Mayer

If you're like me, you've been supplementing your in-person boardgaming with the ability to play online. I've been doing that for over 20 years, way before the covid pandemic struck. However, that worldwide event opened up the joys of online boardgaming to many more gamers, especially as they worked to keep connections going with friends they couldn't see across the table for many months. Add in the explosion of titles and popularity of BoardgameArena, coupled with the widespread use of Discord, Zoom, or other voice/video communication tools, and gamers today have more ability to stay in touch than ever before.

My two guests have taken that, stuck with it, and done more than I've ever managed to do with all of my online play: make a regular game group out of it. Three years on, no longer with the pandemic as the reason, Dave and Mike continue to get together almost every week to play games together. One's in California, the other in Virginia, but they meet more regularly than most in-person game groups. Sometimes they widen the circle to include some other friends like me, but primarily this is a 2-person game group, another interesting aspect.

 

Like me, these guys have been around a long time, have favorites going back decades, yet in this online group they're really espousing the Cult of the New. Why is that? Why are they always learning new games, why do they enjoy online roll & writes so much, and what the heck is Tulpenfieber?! Listen and find out.

 

Closer: The sort of old school games I don't like


-Mark

Openers:

 

Mark: First in Flight
Tim: Arcs

Closers:
Tim: Changing enjoyment (and ratings) of games
Mark: Is it possible to go to too many game events?

Tim

@Denga

If you've followed me for any time, especially on our Discord server, you've heard me talk about a couple things: my appreciation for the "new" podcast Board Game Hot Takes, and my observations of how the energy of our hobby has shifted from when I joined it. I get to combine both of those topics into one episode by inviting one of the three BGHT hosts, Tim, to join me on the mic and use him as a representative of the "next generation" of boardgame hobbyists. He chuckles at that characterization, pointing out he's not that much younger than me, and has been playing boardgames for a few years. But that still makes him the New Kid on the Block compared to an old fart like me, and I think it shows in the types of games he & I both love.

 

That's what we talk about, how the bulk of the hobby may be broadening and unchanging (think about Ticket To Ride, Catan, and Azul at Target stores and on Amazon), but the energetic, active hobbyist part of the hobby appears to be compelled by crowdfunding, plastic figures, and the BGG Top/Hot games lists. I'm not trying to say that's a problem, but I am certain that's it's a difference. At the same time, there are some nice advantages for old-timers like me, whether it's improved game distribution, production enhancements (e.g. double-layer boards), and the most robust online multiplayer options we've ever seen.

-Mark